The process of acquiring funds is a crucial one for any business in its preliminary stage. How you present your ideas to how you present yourself, everything counts! And the worst mistakes that a newbie entrepreneur can make is to bore the investor to death with long slides loaded with non-happening facts, figures and numbers.

But why? Like in any other aspect of life, aesthetics plays an important role here as well. So beautify your presentation, make it look appealing. Tell a story, a rather compelling one, go in sequence, introduce one character after another (slides, we mean) and do not forget the dramatic pause in between. It is easy, you just have to be creative and organised about how you present your business ideas in corporate presentations.

Though there is no rocket science, one may still use some help to get going with the process. It’s okay to get some cold feet, especially if it’s your first time. You are at the right place. This article will hold your hand and will take you through 7 tips that you could keep in mind while pitching your business idea! Read till the end and get yourself all the help that you might need.

Corporate Presentations Session

1. Get along with the investor

Like literally! Prep yourself up. Look presentable and brush up your body language. Put your confidence forward and let your noble mien plead your case. An investor first invests in the entrepreneur and then decides to care two shillings about his idea (if at all). An investor to whom you pitch your business idea will want to know that you have it in you in terms of tenacity, capability and dynamism to see an idea through from scratch to end. So present yourself just as well as you present your idea.

2. Keep your elevator speech prim and trim

This is the slide that talks about your vision and value proposition. Treat it like a tweet where you present the crux of your business in less than 140 characters. Keep it short and simple but powerful enough to resonate. It is a common practice to make reference to another company in the value proposition slide but you have to make sure that the similarity your draw or the comparison you make should be relevant and should do justice to both of you. Eg: “We are the Uber for Pets”

3. Use story-telling techniques to tell your story

Facts and figures grab attention but pictures and images target retention. As per statistics, people retain only 10 percent of the information when delivered through content but add a picture or two to the ensemble and the retention rate shoots up to 65 percent. Also, just don’t talk about yourself, tell a story. All the big brands and businesses out there have a story weaved around them; and a story never fails to fascinate.

4. Propose the problem that you intend to solve

Ideas are good; the great ones are really great but even the best ones won’t fetch you a single penny unless you can get someone to champion your cause. Now, why would someone do that? For others to show interest in your business idea it will have to solve a problem, without which it will be a rather uphill climb for you and your business to set sail. So, pitch the problem your business intends to solve and make it sound grave (back it up with statistics).

5. Define your target market

Or, in other words, define the scope of your business. Who is your audience and why will they buy from you? What is the total market size and who are the big players? Who are you going to compete with and how are you going to stand out? (Here’s where you flag your creativity to position yourself in a way that will make you stand out from the crowd.) This is a slide you would want to load with data, pie charts and statistics for an investor would want to know how much money is currently floating in the market right now, to gauge the size of the market.

6. Pitch your solution in golden terms

So, you have a problem and there are 4 people who can solve it for you. But if you have to choose to turn to just one person who will you go to, and why? You have to figure that out and soon. Well in your case, you have to be the one person that your customer will want to turn to, to solve their problem for them. This is where you will finally get a chance to pitch your product or service, and you better make it appear for what it’s worth. And while describing your offering you will be tempted to praise it, we suggest that you resist your temptation. We understand that you are passionate but probably the rest of the world is yet to follow suit. Instead of focusing on the features, focus on the benefits and get convincing when you are at it! And that should take care of things.

7. Discuss the revenue model

Appropriately placed towards the end, this slide and the couple of slides that follow, should wrap up your presentation nicely. Now that you have spoken about your product and services, you know need to show that it is capable of making money. How are you going to price your product and who is going to bear the bill? Are you a selling a premium product or a budget offering? How do you have an edge over your competitors when it comes to pricing? This slide is your scope to tell (or rather sell) all that.

You can obviously add additional slides to elaborate on your team, financials, funds and allocation of funds and your marketing and sales strategy but make sure that you put an exit strategy in place. That does not harm your confidence, rather it shows your practical and long-term thought process. So, the more convincing you can make it sound, the better it reflects on you. That’s enough advice from us, now just go out there and get done with it! All the best!